The Hobby
by Ridel
Summary: It was just a flue. A simple flue. How could something so small and mundane kill her? 15 years Post P2, Slightly corrupted Android!Wheatley AU.
1. The Flue

**Just a flue:**

He hadn't moved. Not in two days.

Rain drops burst as the wind beat them against the bedroom window. The House wasn't just cold, it was freezing. No one had relit the furnace. She'd have been annoyed about that, he knew. She never was much for the cold...

The whole building seamed to moan as the weather pitched a fit outside, but he didn't have the energy to worry about it falling down around him. Not anymore.

It almost seemed that he'd used up all his reserves in the initial panic. After he'd walked in with the stupid bowl of soup. He'd been feeling good, playful even. Oh, he knew she was sick, which was terrible, but he also knew she'd get better. She always did. And, if he had to be totally, brutally honest, he did enjoy those times he could play nurse. He was taking care of her, she _needed_ him.

It felt so much better to be needed, rather than tolerated.

"G'morning bright eyes! You've been out a solid twelve hours, bit excessive, if you ask me, but you are ill, so I'll cut you some slack. Anyway, point being you've had plenty of time to work of those crackers you ate. Or threw up anyway." The form under the blanket didn't stir. She had her back to him and her arm outstretched, leaning over the side of the bed.

He'd strolled to the bedside table and set the warm bowl down.

"C'mon, rise and shine! I've got some soup here. Very good for the Flue, soup. Or so they say, anyway." She still hadn't moved.

Man alive, she was good and out, wasn't she? He reached out to shake her by the arm.

"Hey c'mon now, I put a lot of work into warming this can of soup up for y-" He cut himself short. She was stiff, and ice cold. This wasn't right. She was always soft and warm to the touch. And with the flue, she'd been positively burning up the night before.

"Ch-Chell?" For something built from wires, metals and plastics, the sensations running through him were incredibly human, as the truth slowly started to assert it's shape.

_Cold, stiff, not breathing she's not breathing..._

A wave of lightheadedness passed through him, the artificial skin on his face seemed to sag and tighten at the same time, some sort of fan went into overdrive in his chest, producing a terrible hot tight feeling.

After that had come a frantic few hours, filled with failed attempts to bring her back. He'd shaken her, screamed at her, tried to force medicine down a throat which would no longer swallow, attempted CPR, which he'd never learned how to do in the first place, but which looked easy enough in films.

Finally, he'd been forced to realize that she was gone for good. Nothing he did would ever bring her back.

He was a Moron and he'd let her die and he didn't know how but it was all his fault.

"It's too soon, it's too bloody _soon!_" He moaned, leaning his back against the wall and slowly sliding to the floor.

It wasn't even as if she was old. She had a few wrinkles, true, but she'd had a hard life. It was enough to put a few creases in anyone's skin. Her hair was graying a bit, but only at the roots near her ears. He wouldn't have even noticed if she hadn't put her hair up to work every day.

She'd always seemed so healthy, working away, fixing things in the house, growing crops, walking for miles to scavenge things in the city. And now she was Just...

The little red wind up clock, which he'd perched on the companion cube months ago, ticked away softly. He didn't pay attention to the time. He barely noticed when the sun had set, and then came back up again.

She wasn't moving. She wasn't breathing. Not so much as a cough in what felt like years.

It wasn't fair. She'd told him she was fine! It was just a flue! It wasn't as if she hadn't had them before. They'd always managed to weather them, and in a week, maybe two, she'd be back to work like nothing had happened.

_But she should have known, shouldn't she? It was her bloody body! Surely she should have realized that something was wrong! That this flue, this one was actually killing her! She could have given him some warning. Should have warned him! But no, she'd had to be all quite and mysterious about it. No, why tell ol' Wheatley I'm going to die? He'll figure it out on his own. Bloody selfish, so bloody her. She just loved to watch him twist, didn't she? To put him on notice and just make him feel so, so..._

"What do I do?" He choked, lost, small, helpless. "What do I do without you?"

He so very desperately wanted to cry, and felt disgusted that he couldn't.

Slowly, he became aware of a soft, continual sound. Gentle, warm, a little melancholy to his ear. Reluctantly he tore his gaze away from the unmoving mass on the bed and settled a good, furious glair on the Companion cube.

It sat loyally by her bedside and played a quiet tune.

She'd been touching it when he'd found her. Gripping one of the boarder peaces as if it were the hand of a friend.

"It should have been my hand she was holding. Not you. You're not even alive, are you? No, you're not."

The cube continued to sing, for lack of a better word. The only song it seemed to know and which only came when it thought he was out of earshot. Probably thought it was comforting her right now.

"Oh for gods- She's dead you idiot! She can't hear you! Shut up! Just shut up!"

He grabbed the nearest object in reach, the bowl of soup, and threw it over arm at the cube. It shattered, spraying broth, congealed fat and chunks of ceramic in every direction. The cube wasn't damaged, though he was glad to hear the song instantly silenced.

That brief shock of anger was enough to bring him back to the present. He shook his head, turned back to the bed, and stood, slowly. "I... I guess I shouldn't just leave you here. Humans burry their dead, right? I think that's it. Burry them and leave a sort of plaque or something so people know who you were and... I... I guess I should do that then..."

He moved forward, dreamlike, and sat on the edge of the bed. As he ran his fingers through her hair, the sensors in his hands told him her skin was cold. And that was it. Just a word in his head. Skin: Cold. It was like after everything, he just couldn't process things properly anymore.

"I... Well I guess I could maybe burry you out by the garden. That's where you did spend most of your time. I, think you were just working though. I mean, it's not really, not very scenic is it? Just a lot of corn and potatoes and beans and things."

He ran another strand of hair between his fingers. It was frazzled and greasy.

"Oh! Hang on! What about that hill with the tree on? You know, the one on the way to town? Now that's scenic. Very evocative of... Well something. Anyway, how about that? Could burry you at the top, maybe carve your name in the tree or something, not having access to much in the way of gravestones. Sound good? Feel free to weigh in with your two cents any time."

She didn't respond. Of course she didn't respond. What was he hoping to do by talking? Catch her out at faking?

It took another half an hour. Finally, he leaned forward and kissed her fondly on the forehead.

"I did love you, you know. And I'm... Well, I miss you already..."

Then he stood, left the room, wandered downstairs, dug in the shed until he found the shovel, and started walking. He didn't bother thinking, just let his legs carry him down the gravel drive, out onto the winding, overgrown road that would lead him where he needed to go.

The storm swallowed him whole, and it wasn't long before he was lost to the sight of the cottage he'd called home.

In the cold bedroom, only the ticking clock gave the place an illusion of life.

Tick, Tock,

Tick, Tock,

Tick, Click, Tock,

Hiss, Tick, Slide, Clatter, Tock.

Like a sigh, the Cube peeled open, blooming like a flower in the sun. Each petal a stark white.

Had either the human or the Android been witness to this, it would have prompted immediate action. He might have tried to run away from it, she might have tried to smash it. As it was, no one was there to react. Not when the cube opened. Not when the portal formed. Not when the claw, large and clumsy seeming in the small bedroom, slipped through the hole in space and grabbed the dead woman. Not when it carefully pulled her, and the hand quilted throw her legs were still tangled in through the portal. Not when the white petals folded back into a cube, sealing itself as if it had never opened.

**A/N**

**So, since NaNoWriMo is right around the corner and I haven't written much of anything in ages, I thought it was about time to get back into the swing of things. So I'm going to be working on a little fanfic project.**

**Basically, I'm going to write AND POST at least 1,000 words of this fic every day (Barring a few at the end of the month when I'll be out of town with my mom.)**

**I'm pretty much making it up as I go along, so I can't promise it'll be any sort of good, or that it'll survive long enough to see the end of its arc, but I've got some ideas for things that will happen and characters I'll use, so I'm hoping it'll at least be, you know, **_**decent**_**. :\**

**I'll be using my own headcanon version of post game Wheatley, so you might notice that his moods will be a bit unstable. This is because he's still slightly corrupted. If you want a few more details, please ask and I'll send you a link to some outlines and artwork I've done on the subject, since FF doesn't like them in stories, understandably. **

**Erm... Let me know what you think? ^_^;;**


	2. The Hobby

**A Hobby:**

The Portal closed, shutting of the cold light of the stormy September afternoon. A colder, highly directional artificial light took its place.

The air seemed heavy with the sounds of fans, moving recycled air through the body of the facility. Cooling computers and ventilating test chambers.

Servos whirred and pistons fired as the huge metal claw lay its precious cargo down in the pool of light. Something huge and white loomed over the dead woman, inspecting her, somehow managing without a face to emote bored disappointment.

"Well well. Look at you." The voice was huge, soft, mocking.

"I'll be honest, I was expecting more from you than this. Only a decade and a half on your own and you're already dead." The test subject didn't respond. Funny, it was remarkably similar to the exchanges they'd had while the woman was alive.

"Still, I'm sure you lived a full and satisfying life." Yes, there was a smugness to the voice. A certain knowingness.

Out of the darkness of the chamber, Another set of claws, different, more refined than the one previous, descended, lifted the body, removed the threadbare sweater, the washed out kakis, the undergarments, cutting each away until she hung, naked in the relative dark.

"Have you gained weight? I shouldn't be surprised, really. Don't worry, though. After a few tests, and perhaps a diet, you should be able to fit into your old jumpsuit just fine. For now, I'll just have to let it out a bit."

A portion of the floor moved aside and a tank, filled with a viscous green liquid rose into view, the contents sloshing sluggishly, but not spilling over the sides.

"Oh I'm fine, thanks for asking. I've been really busy since you left. Did you know that there was an entire wing of test subjects that your moron friend somehow managed not to kill? We've been having a lot of fun. Though I'll admit, their staying power is somewhat... substandard."

The body dropped. The green liquid splashed apart, then came back together with a sickening, gurgling squelch. Inside, the woman instantly loosened and began to free float.

"Remember when I told you that I might take up a hobby after you were gone? Well, I've had lots of time to practice, and I'm quite pleased with the results. Honestly, you'll hardly notice you're dead at all."

A heavy lid tipped forward and slammed down on the tube, sealing the test subject inside. Instantly the noise level increased as unseen machines took over unusual tasks. The green liquid began to bubble in a way which suggested boiling water.

It wasn't long before small, involuntary spasms began in the womans extremities.

"_Hardly_."


	3. The empty house

**The empty house:**

He looked somewhat dead himself when he stumbled back through the cottage door. Dirt and mud coated him from head to toe, grass stains marred his jacket and pants, and the look on his face was enough to send any apocalypse survivor scurrying for their crowbar.

Spending a full day and night digging your best friend's grave was enough to put anyone in a bit of a mood.

He leaned the shovel against the wall haphazardly, and made no move to catch it when it tipped sideways, spattering the dusty hall carpet with clods of dirt.

Stiff, machinelike, he tramped through the house. He didn't bother about his boots either. What did it matter if he tracked mud all over the carpets? Chell was the one who would have told him off about it, but she'd never know.

He stomped up the stairs, slamming his boots down on them as if consciously trying to cause them pain. After all, he was hurting, why should he be the only one?

He didn't actually want to do this. Didn't want to face what was laying in the second bedroom on the right. No he did not. But it was going to have to happen one way or the other, and far too soon he found himself standing at the door, hand outstretched, resting on the wood, pushing it open.

He took a deep breath, braced himself, and started talking immediately, as if his words could act as a buffer between himself and the body.

"Don't talk to me about bloody grave digging in the middle of a bloody hurricane. I swear, I've had enough ice water poured down my neck that it is amazing, _amazing_ that I haven't got any in my internals. Thought I was going to end up needing that grave myself-"

The flow of words stopped abruptly.

The bed was empty.

Just… Empty.

She was gone.

She was gone and the quilt was gone and…

What had she done? Just gotten up and walked away?

He stood for a good minute, just gawping before his mind finally caught up with what his eyes were seeing.

"_CHELL?!"_

He bolted out of the room, wild eyed and short breathed.

She was alive! She had to be! It had all been a trick, of course it had. He knew, HE KNEW, from first hand experience even, she was bloody impossible to kill. And if two omnipotent super computers with an arsenal of turrets, neurotoxin, spike plates and acid couldn't do it, then there was no way some tiny, insignificant germs could.

She'd tricked him! She'd actually _faked_ her own death! Trying to leave him behind again, no doubt. She probably didn't care she'd near traumatized him, no, just as long as it tricked him out of the house and gave herself time to get a decent head start. Oh he was going to bloody _kill_ her for this one!

He ran from room to room, calling her name with a strange mixture of relief and fury. When she wasn't in any of the obvious places- bedrooms, kitchen, Bathroom- he started looking in the less likely ones. Under beds, in the attic, in closets and cupboards.

He ran outside to see if she'd left any prints in the fresh mud, but found only his own, returning from the fresh grave on the hill. He checked the pantry to see if she'd taken the canned goods with her, but it was exactly as he'd left it days ago, when he'd decided to make her soup. He checked her drawers, but found all her clothes present and accounted for.

Eventually, he'd had no choice but to give up. For whatever reason, she just wasn't here anymore.

He wound up back in her room, sitting on her bed and holding his head between his hands.

She just wasn't anywhere. Either she'd run off, taking nothing but their quilt with her- the quilt being the only thing he'd found missing after three hours spent demolishing their modest living space in search of an unaccountably missing corpse- or… Maybe someone had taken her.

He'd met looters before. They tended to go for the food, clothing, mechanical parts. Things that they could use practically. It was unfathomable why some desperate scavenger would make off with a dead girl, but leave everything else in the house untouched.

Anyway, there was no point in continuing to hold onto the idea that she might have been alive after all.. After the injection of mad hope had worn off, he'd remembered how stiff she'd been, how still. Nobody could fake that. Not even her. His conscience nipped at him painfully. How could he have thought all those things earlier? That she'd do this to him. She was practical, and skittish and sometimes a bit cold, but she wasn't sadistic.

Alright, they hadn't always been what you'd call a happy family, but there had been times, hadn't there? Good times. Pleasant, safe, warm times when she'd been strangely at peace with him. Usually he was the one that had to approach her and beg for some time together, but sometimes, sometimes she came to him. She'd ask, in her strange way, if he wanted to come with her on a scavenging trip, if he wanted to help her with the quilt, if he wanted to watch some old film with her, and it had been the best feeling he'd ever had.

But that was all over now. She was completely gone, and now he wouldn't even have the closure he'd hoped would come from a proper burial.

God, what he needed now was something to yell at.

Resting his elbows on his knees, he eyed the Companion cube, sitting so innocently where he'd left it. Streaks of yellow broth and a few dried noodles still stuck to its side.

It was the perfect target. Just looking at it stirred anger, jealousy and disgust in him.

"She always liked you more than me, you know?" He growled. "I know I used to scare her. You could see it in her eyes, sometimes. But you, well, nothing scary about you, is there? You just sit there, all pink and white and safe and you play that stupid song all bloody day for her. Oh don't go feeling all smug about it." He pointed at the cube accusingly.

"Sure you never did anything to hurt her but you didn't bloody help her either, did you? You just, I don't know, just, let her wander right off in the middle of the bloody night or, or let some maniac drifter steal her body before she could be properly laid to rest! _Useless!_ What did you do, be pink at him? Play that kitschy lullaby? What bloody use are you? No, honestly, I _am_ asking. Well, _say something you useless lump!"_

He jolted to his feet, drew his leg back and delivered a kicked which sent box tumbling across the room. It slammed into the far wall and left a hefty dent in the plaster. It was a heavy box, and it felt absolutely wonderful to abuse it so physically.

"You deserved that. Y- and now look, you've left a hole in the wall! She'd be livid about that! It's not as if she doesn't spend enough time mending this place, just to keep it together!"

There was a quiet click, followed by a hiss if escaping air, and then, much to Wheatley's surprise, the box fell apart. Sections peeled away, moved around each other strangely, and lay flat on the floor.

He stared at it, first thinking he'd broken it, then registered the smooth white interior. The way the box had spread itself, not the usual way one would expect of a cube, revealed what looked very much to the android's highly trained eye, like an ideal portal surface.

Confusion shaded to fear, which blossomed into terror as this information filtered through his optic drives and into his head.

"AAAH!" He screamed, rocked back, slamming into the night table and sending the lamp tumbling to its untimely end. He scrambled over the bed and wedged himself in the corner farthest from the cube, trembling, and trying through sheer force of will to push himself through the wall and into the next room.

"It can't be, it can't be it can't be it can't be," He gasped, clutching at his hair. But there it was, sitting right by the door, blocking his exit. So menacing. So familiar.

It was then that Wheatley started to form a new theory on what had happened to the body of his only friend.


	4. Welcome Back

**Welcome back:**

"_Good morning. You have been in suspension for [12] days."\_

The voice sent a shock racing through her body. In seconds she'd gone from a serine, sleeping woman, to a wild creature, confused, caged and terrified. She jolted upright, and instantly realized she wasn't where she ought to be. Her nostrils flared and her pupils dilated as she took in the drab motel setting.

Everything was exactly as she'd remembered. The tacky wood paneling, the wall sized mural of a beach, the old, empty portable fridge tucked under the desk. This relaxation center cubical was in much better repair than the last one she'd been in.

"_Please report to a test associate immediately, to begin your voluntary mandatory testing schedule."_

She stood abruptly, throwing the blanket to one side and almost stopped breathing when she realized what she was wearing.

A bright orange jump suit, zipped up to her neck, and cut off shortly before the familiar form of the long fall boots.

"_Please report to a test associate immediately, to begin your voluntary mandatory testing schedule."_

Chell didn't waste time trying to convince herself that she was dreaming. It would do her no good in the long run. Instead, she tried to remember what she'd been doing before all of this had happened.

Had she ever seen the surface? That seemed much more dreamlike than this. Had she ever lived in that small cottage? Had Wheatley really found her again after five years alone?

"_Please report to a test associate immediately, to begin your voluntary mandatory testing schedule."_

She looked down, and got the second shock of the morning. Numbly, she reached down to pick up the quilt from where she'd tossed it in her panic. The familiar pattern made her normally active mind go silent. It was their quilt. The one she'd made with him. The one they had worked on together, in one of her rare moments of need. The need to be close to someone. The need to let go of her fear and hurt and distrust and just be with someone she loved.

Suddenly a mountain of sensations and memories crashed down around her. She'd been sick. It had been the worst case of the flue she could ever remember having. But then, it was always the worst when you were in the middle of it. She'd been in so much pain, felt like she was being cooked from the inside out, and then… Nothing. Nothing at all that could possibly account for her being here.

"_**Not only are you a murderous lunatic. You also don't listen."**_

Jolting off the bed, the woman instinctively reached for a weapon she did not in fact have.

"_**Hold on, I'm adding that to your file now. Doesn't listen."**_

A cold sweat broke out across Chell's body, though her face went blank and tense.

"_**I can see you're already itching to get your hands on a portal gun, but don't worry, there will be plenty of time for that later. First, I have a few warm up tests for you."**_

* * *

It was surprising, almost downright astonishing that he'd made the decision so quickly. Only a day or so after discovering the Companion Cube's sick little secret, and he had finally gotten up the guts to leave the room.

He wouldn't go so far as to say that it was obvious what had happened to Chell now, but he had a strong hunch, even if he couldn't really think of a good reason behind it.

Why on earth would _she_ want her back? Chell had never been the best communicator, but she had eventually relented to his questioning and explained, in that strange homemade sign language they'd cooked up, that she'd been banished from Aperture. Not quite with the extreme prejudice he'd been evicted, but still, she'd given him to understand that she wouldn't last long if thrown upon the supercomputers good graces again. Not that she'd ever felt the inclination to return.

So, if they were no longer working together, if there really never were any good feelings between them, what did GLaDOS want with the body?

What possible use could she put it to? Did she just want to gloat? Was she somehow punishing him? Trying to drive him mental?

The main, possibly the only redeeming feature the woman had in the computers eye, was her ability to solve complicated tests, but she certainly wouldn't be much use in that department anymore.

Wheatley did not like to admit to being anything short of perfectly reasonable, and above all, sane, neither of which he really was. After the whole chassis ordeal, he'd developed a talent for obsessions, fostering them quickly and nurturing them in the face of severe obstacles. His first big obsession (After testing, which he didn't count because he was hooked into a maniac computer system, and it certainly wasn't his doing at all, nope) had been to apologize. He'd been proper eaten up about what he'd done. He needed to make that feeling stop clamoring in his head, and the only way he knew how to do that was apologize to the friend he'd hurt and gain her forgiveness. That had not gone quite as well as he'd hoped, and even to this day he wasn't sure she really forgave him, never really let him off the hook for the whole relentlessly trying to kill her thing. But all the same, there came another obsession, following closely on the heels of the last, perhaps even born of it. And that obsession, was Chell.

It was funny, he'd never really thought about her back in the enrichment center. She was an extra pair of hands. Something he could use to escape. At best, after he'd come back for her, broken her out of the testing track and explained his strategy of escape, he'd looked on her with the sort of fondness one might have for a very clever animal. A pet chimp maybe.

But never, not once had he looked on her as someone he needed. Not because of her long fall boots or portal gun, or clever neurotoxin hacking little brain. But someone he just needed to be there, with him. Without her, his life seemed so small, so pointless. A thought which would have appalled him years ago. It wasn't that he wanted to die now she was gone. But he just didn't know how to proceed. What was he supposed to do? The world was huge, disheveled and largely hostile.

The point was, he'd spent a good ten years living with the former test subject. She was his family. She was _his_. Period. What right did that oversized, murderous, terrifying cow of a supercomputer think she had to her body? None. _She_ had no right at all. _She'd_ kicked her out. If she wanted her back so bloody badly it was just too bad wasn't it! She belonged to him now. Not her.

And suddenly, much to his surprise (and mild horror) he realized what his next obsession was going to be. It had already started growing in him, and was too big to squash. He could feel it burning the circuits in the back of his mind, like a line of buggy code. And it was getting bigger, tugging at him, the way the itch had, though in a much less physical sense.

Dead or alive, Chell was his. His his _his_. No one else had a right to have her, and not even the only person on this planet he was well and truly terrified of was going to take her away.

Alright, so she had already been taken away. That was a bit of a problem, and not one that was easily fixed. But he'd be damned to android hell if he was going to let her get away with this. Going to let her keep his only friend in the whole world for some nefarious purpose.

Standing, Wheatley crossed the room, gingerly stepping over the flattened form of the companion cube, marched to the hall closet like a soldier preparing to be deployed, and grabbed the huge backpack. Chell always made him carry this one, because it was larger and could hold more heavy objects. He never missed a chance to complain about it, but today, for the very first time, he would wear it without a fuss.

He stopped here, hitting his first road block to action. Alright, he was obviously going to need supplies for this little infiltration mission, but what exactly should those supplies be? He didn't need food or water, he didn't need a flashlight or extra batteries. So he wandered the house, stuffing anything he thought might be vaguely useful into the bag...


End file.
